Training

Having finished a forty day Nabhi Kriya, I was feeling fortified.  This is a kriya with a lot of leg lifts.  It is intense, but completely do-able.  Nabhi Kriya works on the third chakra, the upper chakra in the lower triangle.  The next kriya that I chose for myself was Transforming the Lower Triangle to the Upper Triangle, feeling as if it were time to raise the energy.  It was also time to raise the bar.  This set is full of positions that are very difficult for me, most of which I can’t actually do perfectly, if at all.  Camel pose poses a great amount of difficulty.  Fish pose in celibate pose is almost impossible, for I am neither.  Plow pose?  Can’t do it, my feet dangle over my head and won’t get near the floor.  What kind of yogi am I?  And I call myself a teacher?  I practiced Kundalini Yoga for over 20 years (off and on) before I committed to becoming a teacher.  Why?  Because I could not do it perfectly.  One night, during a tumultuous time in my life (weren’t they all?), my teacher, Guru Singh, came to me in a dream.  In the dream I was in his class and he came up to me and asked me if I was going to take teacher training.  I told him honestly that I could not do much of what I would have to teach.  I felt as if I needed to be double jointed to be a yoga teacher.  He pointed out that my thumb was double jointed. True, said I.  He said that was a good place to start.  The next day, remembering the visitation in my dream, I committed to take teacher training, and my life began to change immediately.  Teacher training has given me a sense of value, of expression, and of purpose.  I honor those Level One trainees that are graduating from Yoga West this weekend, I am so proud of them all, and I pray that their lives become as blessed and beloved as mine has become.  It is not easy.  Transformation is never easy, yet always rewarding, even if it’s just transforming from the lower triangle to the upper triangle.  As Guru Singh says, we are not here to prove anything, we are here to improve everything.  Sat Nam.

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Let Love Grow

Breathe into that wonderful thought that abides in tranquility and kindness.  Allow the visions of confusion, distraught and despair to pass.  Become lost in Love.  This is God’s love. Creator force unchanging, uplifting and transforming.  Allow Her grace to hold you, to mold you into this being of light that abides in you already, waiting to shine.  Release the nagging fear that all is not well.  Abide in Her with patience and mindfulness. Allow your heart to step outside.  Surround yourself in the promise of Love; let love live in you, and breathe through you, to become you, to be You, who you are.

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Hiccups

Hiccups along the way are opportunities to grow, at the very least.  Today I move forward, I walk through loneliness, pain and fear oftentimes; it is set aside and replaced by the oneness of the heart, soul and mind that is given as a gift through the Prana in the work of yoga and meditation, by the Eternal God with and in Whom I am one.  I realize that the child inside of me becomes frightened, but it is the parent, centered in God consciousness, that is able to take the child’s hand and guide him, through the dark, and into the light.     

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Pools

As I pray, meditate and practice the yoga, I slowly release the ties that bind me to certain thoughts, feelings and attitudes. Belief systems and constructs of the mind slowly dissolve, freeing me from wastefulness and want. I have more time to breathe.  I have more time to be.  To be still.  To be still knowing that all is theater, and that God and I are one.

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Space

In meditation I am not stopping my thoughts; I am watching them drift in and out.  When they arise I will label them, and they then dissipate. I try to keep the categories simple.  What is the core desire behind each thought?  Basic needs usually come up: food, sex, companionship, entertainment (distractions). When I place a label on them they know they have been found out and move on.  It is at that point that I have a moment of no thought, before the next one passes by in the parade.  It is these periods of no thought that is feeding me. Like the space between the words, it says more than anything that I can say.

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Shuniya

All my mind seems to understand is the past. Each thought is related to some past thought, action, feeling or desire. Embracing the present, the true present, takes me to a place of non-thought, an emptiness.  This is what the yogis call shuniya, that place of stillness.  Shuniya feeds no desire.  It awakens my consciousness.  I am able to arrive at this place of suspension through pranayama, controlling the movement of my breath.  The answer to the riddle of the mind is in the breath.  Sat Nam.

Blame

How can I blame you, when it is I who feels the way that I do? How often have I blamed someone for how I feel? It really is a shame to blame. It makes me powerless over me, when I am actually powerless over you. I cannot control you; the way that you act, the way that you look, what you are thinking, saying, what you are doing. You are not me. I can only control me, and only then, when I can learn how to be.